Flocking Experiment with Trapcode Particular + new versions

Peder Norrby posted a flocking experiment done with Trapcode Particular; he says:

"In this first test I emitted 40K particles (using a large Box emitter) on the first frame and they are affected only by the Turbulence Field (a 4D perlin noise fractal that is used as 3D displacement). The "birds" are simple black circles.

All movement was made using Physics>Air>Turbulence with a rather large displacement of 4000 px. Then I set down Turbulence>Scale to 1.0 and increased Evolution Speed to 150. In this first test I emitted 40K particles (using a large Box emitter) on the first frame and they are affected only by the Turbulence Field (a 4D perlin noise fractal that is used as 3D displacement). The "birds" are simple black circles. Viemo's compression really doesn't like this clip, download the original file to see it without artifacts."

There more info including example starling flocking and a downloadable AEP at Trapcode Sharelog.

Starlings Study 01 from Peder Norrby on Vimeo.

Update: Najork on Vimeo has a Re-work of Peder Norrby's Starlings Study, with "polygon sprites." Plus version 2 from Peder is available, 'This time I used the "Sprite" particle type with a 20x50 px comp as particle; a small triangle. I used Orient to Motion to make the triangles point in their direction of flight. The number of particles was set down to about 4K.'

Starlings Study 02 from Peder Norrby on Vimeo.

3D Outlined Text Using Particles

AEtuts posted Make Your Own Smooth 3D Outlined Text Using Particles, a tutorial by Roman Komurka. There's only 99 steps in text and pictures in this unique tutorial!

See also Must.have.3D.text and click the tag 3D text to see what other lengths AE users will go to get 3D text effects [update: Adobe take notice, please]. Here's Roman's preview render:

The concepts of planar tracking

VFX trainer Steve Wright has an informative introduction (in QuickTime) to the concepts of planar tracking, the underlying technology behind Mocha tracking tool bundled with After Effects. It's the 1st of a series that will be oriented more to Nuke compositing.

See also Resources for mocha for After Effects and Motion tracking overview and resources in AE Help, as well as AEP posts on Mocha and tracking.

Update: Motionworks collected a few Mocha resources, mostly new ones from Steve Wright in Mocha for After Effects.

Untitled from Ross Shain on Vimeo.

Final Cut Studio 4: a double scoop

Yesterday Mac Soda mused on Final Cut Studio 4: The Inside Scoop, which sent some all atwitter. The article is necessarily speculative and perhaps more fanboy than drivel. Philip Hodgetts, a successful developer and seer of trends, responded quickly with Final Cut Studio 4: The Inside Scoop (from MacSoda), which has its own set of counterpoints well-taken and conjectures (sorry but Nuke is the replacement for Shake).

Hodgetts also recently looked at Apple's AV Foundation and the future of QuickTime (which is quite deep and links to even more deepness on iOS video).

These articles are definitely more fun than the Spring reports of Final Cut retooling for the consumer market. Since the alternatives are uncertain, with Avid apparently still suffering financially and Adobe as yet unproven (and not endorsed by major filmmakers), one can hope that Apple remains committed to the competition even if more out of spite than fast cash.

Update: Even with Apple dragging its feet, the presumed Exodus from Final Cut to Adobe Premiere CS5 seems to have stalled. Oliver Peters explained why a few months ago; see Will CS5 and MC5 toast FCP?

Update 2: Todd Kopriva posted about Premiere Pro overview documents for Final Cut Pro and Avid Media Composer users. Users switching platforms at this point may only be about money at the lower end, since Premiere is still 3rd choice in the NLE hierarchy. For context, see Final Cut Studio 4: a double scoop.

There's really no secret about the kinds of things Adobe could do to improve usability and mindshare beside luring the lukewarm from the Apple camp -- assuming that there are goals in addition to short-term sales. There's plenty of advice aimed at Apple that Adobe could implement. Beyond constant drumbeats pleading for Avid-style media management and Trim Mode (see FCP-List for pro/cons), there are more examples in the feature request list at FCPro.TV and advice from Oliver Peters on Improving FCP and Media Composer.

Update 3: humor from @BeetleCarDriver,

@editblog While you were gone Apple released FCS5...

@editblog ....My mistake, it was a ProApps update...

Update 4: maybe someday a Premiere fan will get a rebuttal from an Avid user; see Dylan Reeve on What IS the big deal about FCP?

Wiggly World: Deeper Modes of Expressions #9

Chris and Trish Meyer posted the 9th of the 12-part series Deeper Modes of Expression, based on an extra in their book Creating Motion Graphics with After Effects, which was recently updated for CS5.

The 9th installment is Deeper Modes of Expression, Part 9: Wiggly World on "how to apply the basic wiggle expression, and then add finer degrees of control to it. ... We think the wiggle expression is one of the core tools to include in your expression toolkit. However, you should know that many basic wiggle moves are available as a set of Animation Presets (look in the Behaviors subcategory). If you want to dive even deeper into random values, the next installment is for you. In it we’ll discuss the differences between random, gaussRandom, and noise, changing seed values, and freezing animations. [emphasis added]"

CS5 bug fixes, RED, & CUDA enhancements

Todd Kopriva details the latest updates to AE and Premiere CS5 in After Effects CS5 (10.0.1) update: bug fixes and RED features and Premiere Pro CS5 (5.0.2) update: bug fixes and CUDA support.

More slow motion from pictures using Pixel Motion

Michael DeVowe follows up his color correction tutorial (in AE using Photoshop Curves) with Slow Motion From Pictures! [After Effects Pixel Motion Tutorial]. See the tutorial (via) below.

This tutorial adds some detail (see notes on Vimeo) to other tutorials (by Eran Stern and "The Great Zimm" aka Adam Meyers) posted earlier in Extreme slow motion using still frames in AE (instead using RE:Vision Twixtor Pro) and Motion estimated morphing time-remapping on stills. This technique might also be applied to smooth over jump cuts, as noted by Wes Plate; see Morph to smooth a jump cut.

As noted by Rob Antill, if you're using not burst mode, shots will work work better if they have a central focal point. Also, you may find more control using the Timewarp filter (Chris Meyer says you can check out additional details on this filter in The Foundry's Kronos documentation).


Slow Motion From Pictures! [After Effects Pixel Motion Tutorial] from ☞ Michael DeVowe on Vimeo.